The Brief
This was a travel feature written for OnboardOnline about chartering a superyacht in the remote northwest of Australia. A place of lonely archipelagos, staggering river gorges and towering waterfalls surrounded by desert, the Kimberley region offers some of the most spectacular cruising on the planet. This article was targeted towards the new breed of superyacht guests who want new experiences in cruising grounds far off the beaten track.
Crocodiles and Drop Bears: Cruising the Australian Kimberley
We stood on the aft deck with the guests, watching a reef rise out of the sea with the turn of the immense Kimberley tide. The water hissed loudly as it poured off the brown coral, its sides curved over time by the daily torrent. I looked for stranded fish flapping about, but found none. I expect they’re used to this kind of thing by now.
In north-western Australia, far from the crowded anchorages of the Mediterranean, there’s an area called the Kimberleys. I thoroughly recommend that you go there. Three times the size of England with only about 40 000 inhabitants, its rocky red coastline, thundering waterfalls and aqua seas offer some of the most staggering cruising grounds the world has to offer. Just don’t plan on watersports.
The Kimberleys has a bizarre modern history. Few know that it was briefly considered as a possible Jewish homeland in the early 1900’s- before ancient Palestine was ultimately decided on – and again as a Jewish resettlement option for refugees escaping Nazi Germany. It was also reportedly the only spot in Australia where the Japanese enemy made landfall during WW2, when a reconnaissance party of four soldiers went scouting for secret weapons bases in the Outback*, and apparently returned to Japan suggesting that some prisoners should be released from Japanese jails to wage guerrilla warfare in Australia.
Why is it always the criminals that are sent to invade Australia? The plan wasn’t taken up by the Japanese army, who may have predicted that the convicts would get too comfortable there and come back saying ‘Strewth, Bruce San’ and beating them at cricket/sumo wrestling. Or a combination of the two, which would be much more entertaining.
Mind you, you won’t see any evidence of mankind’s turbulent history while floating through the Kimberleys. It’s quite possible you won’t see any evidence of mankind at all. This is cruising at its most remote, where you can spend weeks and not see another person, another boat – just the occasional buzz of a border control plane overhead, contacting the yacht to check that it’s not running a sideline smuggling Afghanis into the great brown land. Read full article here.
*Image credit: Jon Conor via Flickr